Elei's Chronicles (Books 1-3) (56 page)

Chapter Two

E
lei returned
to the low table and dropped the cig into the ashtray. Now he was lucid and out of bed, he needed to take stock of everything once more, from his body to his memories and plans for the future. He’d seen the contents of the box they’d stolen only once, and he’d been too wrecked then to fully grasp what they meant. The box must be important if Pelia had wanted them to get it.

‘If’
being the operative word.
Dreams
. But like Kalaes’ nightmares, they had a good deal of memories thrown in. And it had all panned out. They’d gotten into the Gultur Palace, opened the safe, found and taken the box.

He eyed the chairs but felt too nervous to sit. He heard low voices in the other room — Hera’s, quiet and lilting, Kalaes’, vibrating, teasing — and the scent of ripe fruit and
como
flowers reached him, challenging his control. He clenched his hands, grateful for the sting of his nails digging into his palms. He hadn’t endured these last days for nothing. Rex was weaker, had to be. But the scent brought on a horrifying memory of pain tearing through his chest, the world spinning and time stretching like elastic—

He drew a deep, calming breath.
I’m fine
. He uncurled his fingers, splayed them against his thighs. It hadn’t been a real heart attack, only restricted blood flow to his heart because of all the adrenaline Rex had pumped into his veins. Or so Hera had said.

Then Hera walked into the room, heart-wrenchingly beautiful in her gray suit of polyesthene, her dark hair coiled at her nape, as it had been the first time he’d seen her. Rex stirred at her proximity and started the hammering inside his possessed eye. 

Screw this
. Elei focused on her familiar face, her look of concern.
Screw you, Rex. She’s my friend
. She’d stayed away from him these past days, to calm Rex and let him rest. Maybe she’d also been afraid. After all, he’d pointed a gun at her. Not something you could easily forget.

“Good evening,” Hera said, her voice soft. She held the long, flat box they’d retrieved from Dakru City. She didn’t wear a bandage on her arm now, and her face bore only a faint scar from the bullet. Regina had sped up the healing process. “I see you’re feeling better.”

He nodded, forcing his face to relax, his shoulders to straighten. At least he didn’t feel the need to slit her neck and taste her blood, watch her die.
Good enough
.

Sacmis appeared at the door, sandy hair framing her clear-eyed face, and he tensed again. Her lip curled a little, not so much a smile as a sneer, and she followed Hera inside to stand by the door.

“Sit,” Kalaes growled and nodded at the seats around the table.

“Or what, you’ll shoot me, mortal?” Sacmis breathed, the sneer turning into a smirk.

“Do you want me to?” Kalaes’ smile was all teeth.

Elei’s pulse thundered in his ears and he took a step back, trying to compose himself. His hands twitched into fists.

“You’re stressing him,” Hera snapped and dragged Sacmis to the table. The other Gultur’s eyes widened, but she sank obediently into a chair. Hera kept a hand on her, as if to keep her down.

“Well then, now that issue has been settled...” Kalaes turned to Elei. “You sit down too, fe. We’re all friends here.” His hand settled on Elei’s shoulder, its weight comforting. “Though one of us is missing.”

“Alendra asked to be excused.” Hera avoided Elei’s gaze. “She’s cooking us some dinner.”

Better so
, Elei told himself. At least he wouldn’t have to see her frightened face. It’d give him time to recuperate, raise his defenses.

Hera and Kalaes exchanged an undecipherable look, and then she leaned over and placed the box reverently on the low table. “Do you remember my dreams?” Her gaze slid toward Elei. “About the Seven Islands?”

“Nightmares,” Elei corrected absently, his nerves raw. Rex’s reaction, not his own.
Fight it
.

Hera had dreamed of the islands rising like naked blades, impaling her. Of course he remembered. He thought of his own dreams, of himself shooting Pelia, of children killing him, of people dying over and over again.
Just dreams
. He clenched his teeth. Yeah, right, like it was ever that simple.

“You never told me of any nightmares.” Sacmis’ voice ended on a soft exhalation. Hera tensed, her lips pressing together.

There were probably many things Hera hadn’t told the other Gultur. Hera hadn’t talked to Sacmis in years, not until her sudden appearance a few days back at the hospital, while she and Elei were breaking Kalaes out. What did she expect? Although looking at the way Sacmis gazed on Hera, her gray eyes warm, she seemed to expect a lot more. And wasn’t it the wrong thing to imagine again, their beautiful faces bent together, their slender bodies naked, touching...
Gods, mercy
.

Kalaes’ hand on his shoulder tightened a fraction. “Why are we talking about Hera’s dreams?” He leaned forward, his voice turning into a low purr, and the sweet scent of ama cigarette filled Elei’s nostrils. “Did Pelia force info into your subconscious like she did with Elei? Any other safety box we need to break open?”

“Sit down, pet.” Hera pointed to an empty chair. “Then I’ll explain.”

Kalaes snorted, patted Elei’s shoulder and folded his arms across his chest. “I’d rather stand. Not so good at taking orders from you, or anyone, for that matter.”

Hera’s lips twitched and Kalaes grinned.
Typical
. A glance told him Sacmis was scowling. What the hells did she think, that they all obeyed Hera’s every word?

Come to think of it, maybe she did. Elei forced his hands to unclench. He knew close to nothing about Sacmis or her sudden appearance, her claim that she wanted to help, that she belonged to the resistance, that she’d missed Hera. Unless she’d explained herself while he’d been tucked away in bed, sick like a dog.

“All right then.” Hera cleared her throat. “Forget the dreams. Let us focus on the documents.”

She knelt down by the table and unlatched the box. She pulled and spread out a big square paper, a map Elei fuzzily recalled examining while leaving Gortyn. He braced his hands on the table and studied the complex geometrical web stretching around and, apparently, below the Seven Islands. There were crosses marked on certain locations, some on the islands, and some in the sea.

He raised his eyes to Hera who was unfolding more documents. “What did you find out?” he asked. The map was complex, and some of the lettering was in a strange alphabet. “What do these say, can you read them?”

Hera spread out a densely written manuscript, curlicues jutting up and down, a bramble of a text. “I’m no text specialist,” she said drily, “and this looks really old. But this,” she unfolded another document, printed in black ink, “might help.” It was the last item in the box.

They bent over it.

“Vocabulary lists?” Kalaes said after a few beats of silence.

“Interpretation lists.” Sacmis tapped a forefinger against a column. “Of symbols.”

Symbols that resembled the ones Elei had seen inside the sewer tunnels. “A key to the map?” he suggested.

“It seems like it,” Hera said.

They looked up and exchanged puzzled glances.

“So...” Kalaes straightened, one dark brow raised in question. “Gotta ask, are we any pissing wiser? Because I sure don’t feel like it.”

“You would not, in any case,” Sacmis said, and Hera winced.

“I see your lips movin’, honey,” Kalaes drawled, “but I seem to have tuned you out. Sorry.” His grin was nowhere near repentant, though.

Sacmis growled deep in her throat, and stretched back on the chair like a dangerous cat. Elei could see why Hera had fallen for her. She was beautiful, all frosty perfection with her full lips, bright eyes and slim body. He saw Kalaes’ eyes glint appreciatively as they followed its lines.

Hera rapped her knuckles on the table and cast a dark look on Kalaes, whose grin widened even more. Was she jealous? “If you two are finished, I’ll tell you what I’ve gleaned from the map and documents.”

Silence settled like a thick blanket over the room.

Kalaes, distracted, sat in the chair Hera had indicated and forgot to argue about it. “So? Will you tell us anytime today?”

“If you stop talking,” Hera said sweetly. “Look here, and here.” She touched a symbol on the island of Kukno, and a similar one on Ost. “The symbol means ‘below’.”

“That’s the word Pelia used,” Elei said.

“Yes.” Hera consulted the lists, then tapped another spot. “Now look here.” It was a rectangular shape that seemed to be beneath Dakru. Similar symbols were inked below the other islands. “Hive.”

“Bees?” Kalaes scratched the back of his head. “That cannot be the mighty secret. A hive for what?”

Hera licked her lips. Her dark eyes caught the last rays of light as evening fell, gleaming like crystals. “I have an idea. Look here.” She traced Dakru, then the other islands. “In the center of each Island, below its name, stands the word for garden.”

Garden?
Elei reached out to touch a symbol he thought he recognized from the sewer tunnels. An oval cut by two parallel lines. “And what’s this?”

“Dakron,” Hera said, checking her list.

“Deposits?” Elei touched slid his finger down the left, to a shape in the sea. “And this?”

“That is...” Hera’s slender brows locked. “Mouth. Probably an older term for a mine entrance.”

“So, this is... what, a geological map?” Kalaes stifled a yawn. He still had nightmares, and on top of that he’d been taking care of Elei for the past couple of days.

Elei looked away, guilt a weight in his belly. He should look after Kalaes, especially since the older boy’s capture by the Gultur, who had put him through the nether hells and back.

“Have you ever seen a geological map where natural formations are so perfect?” Hera waved a hand as if trying to capture a word from the air. “So symmetrical, so geometrical.”

“Actually, I’ve never really seen a geological map.” Kalaes grinned. “So what are you saying?”

Yes, what was she saying?

“‘With a clap of thunder and fast as lightning, seven islands rose from the ocean deep’,” Hera whispered. “‘Ker, Torq, Ert, Aue, Kukno, Ost, and rich Dakru.’ So wrote Sarpion three hundred years back.”

“Sarpion, whoever the hells he was, sounds like a pretentious prick,” Kalaes declared and grabbed another cigarette from the package lying on the table.

“He was an historian,” Sacmis snapped.

“Oh yeah?” Not looking impressed in the least, Kalaes lit his cig.

“Do you have any idea how little is known about the Islands?” Hera frowned. “Apart from the belief that they rose simultaneously and the fact they’re similar in geography and size, information is scarce. We only know that each island’s surface is about five hundred square miles, composed of steep central mountain massifs, which are surrounded by lowlands stretching down to the coast. Fresh water springs from the mountains. Yet the Gultur system contains no scientific information about the origins of the islands or their curious symmetry.”

“You’ve been digging into this for a while, haven’t you?” Elei was fascinated by her entranced expression. Then his mind caught up with her words. “Symmetry isn’t normal? Why?”

“Symmetry in a face means health.” Hera’s eyes flicked to Sacmis, and Elei had to admit it was a perfect example, from the wide mouth to the sculpted cheekbones and slender brows. “Symmetry in a crystal means adherence to basic laws of physics. Symmetry in islands rising from the sea is unusual. These seven islands emerged in a perfect circle. Their proximity made it possible to connect them with the steel bridges, both between each and with Dakru at their center. How can this be natural?”

“And your point is?” Kalaes crossed his arms. “That the islands are pretty, like Sacmis?” He smirked at Sacmis, and her cheeks colored.

Elei’s lips twitched.

“My point is that such symmetry in the islands may not be natural.” Hera’s cheeks had colored, too.

Another hush fell, this time a little strained. The air hummed with tension, like a taut wire.